The government's moral bankruptcy

In its efforts to destroy, finally, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, the Sri Lankan government has resorted to barbarous, murderous attacks on civilians. To the extremists who populate the cabinet and senior ranks of the generals, there is no distinction made betweeen Tiger terrorist and Tamil civilian, between those with guns and those without. All Tamils in the North and East are assumed to be Tigers or Tiger sympathizers. No mercy is given to them. No hesitancy comes before the order to fire.

To every accusation of brutality and cruelty, the government has the same, Bush-like response; we will do everything possible to defeat "the terrorists", and we will make no response between they and those who "shelter" them. We have no time to waste to spare lives against the "ruthless" terrorists who want us dead. We must kill, destroy, and burn to save our country.

The moral bankruptcy of this argument is evident. For, of course, with its superior firepower, the government has killed far more civilians than the Tigers ever have. A Human Rights Watch report makes clear the staggering toll. The Sri Lankan armed forces have repeatedly targeted schools, churches, and refugee camps. They do not care if civilians die, as many have; far more civilians, in fact, are killed in these offensives as actual Tiger fighters, of whom capture or death remains elusive.

If the Army has learned nothing else from nearly a quarter century of war in Sri Lanka, it is that massacring the civilian population is not the way to win the hearts and minds of the Tamil people. Every woman killed by an exploding shell has a son swearing revenge by joining the Tigers. Every child's life ended by a grenade thrown in a church has a relative abroad who will retaliate with money and assistance to the Tigers. It is the same mistake the United States has made in Iraq and Afghanistan. You cannot kill the very people you are ostensibly trying to liberate.